Macbook battery?

Hi everyone. I have a brand new macbook (the older black model, not the aluminium one). How long should the battery last with the airport on?

It's brand new i'm getting about 1hr and a half tops on a full charge. Is this normal?

How long the battery will last depends on what else you're doing with the machine at the same time Airport is on and how you have the power saver functions set. I can get three hours from my battery if I let the machine idle (no other activity), screen off, and have Airport on.

Regards.

All I am doing is genreal net use. No downloading. Screen brightness on half.

Download iStat Pro to keep an eye on the health of your battery, especially on the number of cycles. Then go to System Preferences and tweak the Energy Saver settings. Bluetooth sucks a lot of battery life as well, so you might want to turn that off when it is not in use.

What other things do you have running in the background? Time Machine maybe?

I get nearly 5 hours with airport on and the screen on the lowest but 1 setting.
Thats doing just basic web browsing and listening to music through itunes.

jamin100 said:

I get nearly 5 hours with airport on and the screen on the lowest but 1 setting.
Thats doing just basic web browsing and listening to music through itunes.

Click to expand...

Five hours? Wow, that's amazing.

make sure your bluetooth is disabled if you're not using it. that may help a bit too.

I have seen a drop in mine as well recently as this is brought up is there a definative - read this for all battery issues type thread?

I get about 4 hours w/ airport and moderate itunes listening
more if i'm lucky
i get about 3.5 hours with intense web surfing, lots of apps on, itunes , watching a movie etc..
and yes i do all these things simultaneously! im crazy

I dont have bluetooth on. Just airport. I'm going to let the battery die then charge it full and test it.

I got a macbook pro with core 2 duo and i get insane battery life (its about 20 days old ). I can get up to 3 hours if i am just running airport, no blue tooth, screen brightness set to as low as i can handle. I also adjust my fan speeds when i am not plugged in to normal, when i am plugged in i run them faster (protect the family jewels when the nuclear reactor core is on my lap)

Another trick to keep the battery lifespan of your computer is when you aren't using it, keep the charge at a minimum of 35% and a max of 70%. In terms of charging Li Ion batteries, manufacturers way over charge them in order to get peak energy densities, but not peak lifespan, so by keeping the charge state low, you will have the battery last longer. Also the cooler you run your laptop, the cooler your battery will be and longer it will last lifespan wise.